By LaRae Free Kerr

Marcus Herennius Polymita served in the Roman army of Emperor Trajan, apparently participating in the conquest of King Decebalus of Dacia. When the dust had settled, and the country was annexed, Marcus Herennius Polymita received his pension “papers.”

Only Marcus’ document wasn’t paper, but two metal plates that fit together. His pension was given by imperial decree on 14 Oct AD 109 and gave Marcus Roman citizenship, a powerful status offered to only a few, plus a grant of military honors. These plates Marcus carried with him were signed by seven individuals. Just to make sure the pension stuck to him, his name and those of many other soldiers were publicly posted on a temple wall in Rome.

Very few of these “pension” plates exist today because after the soldiers died, the plates were either melted or cut into small pieces and used as coins. But Marcus lost his somewhere near the border of present-day Bulgaria and Romania. The plates have now found their way to the Harold B Lee Library at Brigham Young University in Provo where they can be viewed through March 2008.

We wouldn’t know about Marcus Herennius Polymita if it weren’t for his pension “papers.” The same can be said of more modern pensioners, soldiers whose requests for pensions fill out pedigree charts and family group sheets.

I have in my hands a legal-sized binder holding Civil War pension papers for many of my great-great uncles and cousins, ordered long before computers and digitization. Absalom P Free, a first cousin two times removed, for example, appeared before the Clerk of the Circuit Court in Vanderburgh County, Indiana as a result of the veterans Act of May 11, 1912.

Absalom P Free claimed benefits at age 72 because he was totally unable to perform manual labor due to his service in the Civil War. When he enrolled for battle on the 10th of August 1862 as a Private in Company “I” 80th Regiment of the Illinois Volunteer Infantry he was 5 feet 6 inches tall with a light complexion and blue eyes.

An older document included in Absalom’s pension papers indicated he was taken sick with the measles at the camp at Blue Spring Valley for three weeks which took the sight of his right eye. In still another document, Absalom certified that his wife was Elizabeth Boman whom he married 4 September 1861 in Nashville, Illinois, and his only living child was Eliza Free born 3 November 1862. His other daughter, who died shortly after birth is also named, the only source in all the world for her. A Clerk’s certificate of marriage is included as is Absalom’s death certificate; documents necessary for his widow to continue receiving a pension.

When Absalom’s name is entered in Ancestry.com’s Civil War records, a brief history of the 80th regiment of I Company appears, showing the battles in which he participated in Kentucky, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee.

The index card from Ancestry.com includes the veteran’s file number. With that number a researcher can obtain NATF Form 85 by emailing inquire@nara.gov to request as many copies of the form as desired. When the form arrives, it should be filled out and sent to National Archives and Records Administration , ATTN: NWCTB, 700 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, Washington DC, 20408-0001.

The Civil War pension files solved so many genealogical problems for my family, could the earlier Revolutionary War papers solve problems of that era? Specifically, could the Joshua Perkins whose pay vouchers are available through FootNote.com be either of my Joshua Perkins?

The pay vouchers showed that Joshua Perkins who enlisted in Isle of Wight County, Virginia served from Feb 1777 through Jun 1779. Is it probable that my 5th great grandfather or his son was the Private from Isle of Wight?

The younger Joshua Perkins was born about 1765, so he would have been only twelve years old if he had enlisted in 1777. His father, born 1728, was fifty-one years old in 1777. It would certainly be too old for today’s army. But many older men served during the Revolutionary War, though they probably confined their activities to local militias.

However, when I checked the older Joshua Perkins’ time line for 1777 to 1778, I found he was farming in Caldwell County, in Burke County and that he purchased an additional 300 acres on Howard’s Creek in Burke County, North Carolina 7 Jan 1779. He found a mare in the mountains and sold it 24 Dec 1778 in Burke County. No man, especially a fifty-year-old man could have served in the army every month between Feb 1777 and Jun 1779 and done these other things as well.

Even though the Revolutionary War records did not have pension papers, the pay vouchers showed rather conclusively that the Joshua Perkins who served in the Revolutionary War from Isle of Wight, Virginia was not ours. Even a “no” is valuable in genealogical research.

LaRae Free Kerr, M ED can be reached at Itsallrelatives@sfcn.org.